For once he heard somebody whisper, "Oh, you were right! the world IS flat--for six months it's been as flat as a pancake!" And a second voice whispered, "Then I was wrong! for pancakes are round." And Martin said to himself, "That's Joyce!" but the first voice he couldn't recognize. And then followed a sound that was not exactly a whisper, yet not exactly unlike one; and Martin darted towards it, but touched only air.

And again he heard a mysterious voice whisper, "How could you keep yourself so secret all these months? I couldn't have. However can girls keep secrets so long?" And the answer was, "They can't keep them a single instant if you come and ask them--but you didn't come!" "What a fool I was!" whispered the first voice, but whose Martin could not for the life of him imagine. Yet he was sure that the other was Jennifer's.

And again he heard that misleading sound which seemed to be something, yet, when he sought it, was nothing.

And now he heard another unknown whisperer say, "You should have seen my drills in the wheatfield last April! How the drill did wobble! Why, I was that upset, any girl could have thrown straighter than I drilled that wheat." And a second whisperer replied, "It MUST have been a sight, then, for girls throw crookeder than swallows fly!" This was surely Jessica; but who was the first speaker?

He was as strange to Martin as another one who whispered, "It was the silence got on my nerves most--it was having n.o.body to listen to of an evening. Of course there were the lads, but they never talk to the point." "I often fear," whispered a second voice, "that I talk too much at random." "Good Lord! you couldn't, if you talked for ever!" Each of these two cases ended as the first two had ended; and for Martin in as little result.

He hastened to another part of the orchard where the whispers were falling fast and fierce. "It was Adam's fault after all!" "No, I've found out that it was Eve's fault!" "But I've been looking it up." "And I've been thinking it over." "Rubbish! it WAS Adam's fault." "It was NOT Adam's fault. What can a stupid little boy know about it?" "I'm a month older than you are." "I don't care if you are. It was Eve's fault." "Well, don't make a fuss if it was." "Wasn't it?" "Stuff!"

"WASN'T it?" "Oh, all right, if you like, it was Eve's fault." "Here's an apple for you," said Joscelyn quite distinctly. "Oh, ripping! but I'd rather have a--" "Sh-h! RUN!" Martin was just too late. "Rather have a what?" said Martin to himself.

He was beginning to feel lonely. His hair was wet with rain. He hadn't seen a milkmaid for an hour. He prowled low in the gra.s.s hoping to catch one unawares. In the swing he saw a shadow--or was it two shadows? It looked like one. And yet--

One half of the shadow whispered, "Do you like my new corduroys?" "Ever so much," whispered the other half. "I'm rather bucked about them myself," whispered the first half, "or ought I to say about IT?" "I think it's them," said the second half. The first half reflected, "It might be either one thing or two. But arithmetic's a nuisance--I never was good at it." The second half confessed, "I always have to guess at it myself. I'm only really sure of one bit." "Which bit's that?"

whispered the first half, and the second half whispered, "That one and one make two." "Oh, you darling! of course they don't, and never did and never will." "Well, I don't really mind," said little Joan. And then there was a pause in which the two shadows were certainly one, until the second half whispered, "Oh! oh, you've shaved it off!" And this delighted the first half beyond all bounds; because even in the circ.u.mstances it was clever of the second half to have noticed it.

But Martin could bear no more. He sprang forward crying "Joan!"--and he grasped the empty swing. And round the orchard he flew, his hands before him, calling now "Joyce!" now "Jane!" now "Jessica!" "Jennifer!"

"Joscelyn!" and again "Joan! Joan! Joan!" And all his answer was rustlings and shadows and whispers, and faint laughter like far-away echoes, and empty air.

All of a sudden the light rain stopped and the moon came out of her cloud. And Martin found himself standing beside the Well-House, and n.o.body near him. He gazed all around at the familiar things, the apple-trees, the swing, the green wicket, the broken feast in the gra.s.s. And then at the far end of the orchard he saw an unfamiliar thing. It was a double ladder, arched over the hawthorn. And up the ladder, like a golden shaft of the moon, went six quick girls, and ahead of each her lad.* And on the topmost rung each took his milkmaid by the hand and vanished over the hedge.

Martin Pippin was left alone in the Apple-Orchard.

*It is not important, but their names were Michael, Tom, Oliver, John, Henry, and Charles. And Michael had dark hair and light lashes, and Tom freckles and a snub-nose, and Oliver a mole on his left cheek, and John fine red-gold hair on his bronzed skin; and Henry was merely the Odd-Job Boy whose voice was breaking, so he imagined that it was he alone who ran the farm. But Charles was a dear. He had a tuft of white hair at the back of his dark head, like the cotton-tail of a rabbit, and as well as corduroy breeches he wore a rabbit-skin waistcoat, and he was a great nuisance to gamekeepers, who called him a poacher; whereas all he did was to let the rabbits out of the snares when it was kind to, and destroy the snares. And he used the bring "bunny-rabbits"

(which other people call snapdragons) of the loveliest colors to plant in the little garden known as Joan's Corner. I should like to tell you more about Charles (but there isn't time) because I am fond of him. If I hadn't been I shouldn't have let him have Joan.

EPILOGUE

At c.o.c.kcrow came the call which in that orchard was now as familiar as the rooster's.

"Maids! Maids! Maids!"

Martin Pippin was leaning over the green wicket throwing jam tarts to the ducks. Because in the Well-House Gillian had not left so much as a crumb. But when he heard Old Gillman's voice, he flicked a bull's-eye at the drake, getting it very accurately on the bill, and walked across to the gap.

"Good morning, master," said Martin cheerfully. "Pray how does Lemon, Joscelyn's Suss.e.x, fare?"

Old Gillman put down his loaves with great deliberation, and spent a few minutes taking Martin in. Then he answered, "There's scant milk to a Suss.e.x, and allus will be. And if there was not, there'd be none to Joscelyn's Lemon. And if there was, it would take more than Henry to draw it. And so that's you, is it?"

"That's me," said Martin Pippin.

"Well," said Old Gillman, "I've spent the best of six mornings trying not to see ye. And has my daughter taken the right road yet?"

"Yes, master," said Martin, "she has taken the road to Adversane."

"Which SHE'S spent the best of six months trying not to see," said Old Gillman. "Women's a nuisance. Allus for taking the long cut round."

"I've known many a short cut," said Martin, "to end in a blind alley."

"Well, well, so long as they gets there," grunted Gillman. "And what's this here?"

"A pair of steps," said Martin.

"What for?" said Gillman.

"Milkmaids and milkmen," said Martin.

"So they maids have cut too, have they?"

"It was a full moon, you see."

"I dessay. But if they'd gone by the stile they could have hopped it in the dark six months agone," said Old Gillman. And he got over the stile, which was the other way into the orchard and has not been mentioned till now, and came and clapped Martin on the shoulder.

"Women's more trouble," said he, "than they're worth."

"They're plenty of trouble," said Martin; "I've never discovered yet what they're worth."

"We'll not talk of em more. Come up to the house for a drink, boy,"

said Old Gillman.

Martin said pleasantly, "You can drink milk now, master, to your heart's content. Or even water." And he walked over to the Well-House, and pointed invitingly to the bucket.

Old Gillman followed him with one eye open. "It's too late for that, boy. When you've turned toper for six months, after sixty sober years, it'll take you another six to drop the habit. That's what these daughters do for their dads. But we'll not talk of em." He stood beside Martin and stared down at the padlock. "How did the pretty go?"

"In the swing, like a swift."

"Why not through the gate like a gal?"

"The keys wouldn't turn."

"Which way?"

"The right way."

"You should ha' tried em the wrong way, boy."

"That would have locked it," said Martin.

"Azactly," said Old Gillman; and slipped the padlock from the staple and put it in his pocket. "Come along up now."

Martin followed him through the orchard and the paddock and the garden and the farmyard to the house. He noticed that everything was in the pink of condition. But as he pa.s.sed the stables he heard the cows lowing badly.

The farm-kitchen was a big one. It had all the things that go to make the best farm-kitchens: such as red bricks and heavy smoke-blackened beams, and a deep hearth with a great fire on it and settles inside, from which one could look up at the chimney-shaft to the sky, and clay pipes and spills alongside, and a muller for wine or beer; and hams and sides of bacon and strings on onions and bunches of herbs; much pewter, and a copper warming-pan, and bra.s.s candlesticks, and a grandfather clock; a cherrywood dresser and wheelback chairs polished with age; and a great scrubbed oaken table to seat a harvest-supper, planed from a single mighty plank. It was as clean as everything else in that good room, but all the scrubbing would not efface the circular stains wherever men had sat and drunk; and that was all the way round and in the middle. There were mugs and a Toby jug upon it now. Old Gillman filled two of the mugs, and lifted one to Martin, and Martin echoed the action like a looking-gla.s.s. And they toasted each other in good Audit Ale.

"Well," said Old Gillman stuffing his pipe, "it's been a peaceful time, and now us must just see how things go."

"They look shipshape enough at the moment," said Martin.